Will the Framingham Community Fight Deep Cuts to the Schools and the Disruption of Senior Services

The FY27 budget public hearing at 7pm today offers the community its only real opportunity to let the City Council know what it thinks

Notice:

The annual public hearing on the Framingham FY27 city budget will be held at the City Council meeting at 7pm this evening, Tuesday, June 2 at City Hall. The agenda link provides more details, including a Zoom link for remote participation:

Agenda

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The current proposal for the FY27 city budget delivers a large, last minute $3.2 million cut to the school system, bringing the total staff loss to 116 positions, disrupts a smoothly run, expanding Senior Services program, by firing its Director, Randy Aylsworth, and fails to reap millions in annual savings possible with a solar installation expansion.

Truly, this is a trifecta of failures, which has been painfully on display in the city budget review process.

This evening at 7pm, there is an opportunity for the community to weigh in on the damage the City Council is inflicting on the city, as it pursues its goal of low taxes no matter the cost.

There have been opportunities for public comment in the several prior budget review meetings of the City Council Finance Committee, but those meetings have been held at 5pm, a time designed to suppress public input, especially from parents who are busy with jobs and family at that time.

So, this is showdown time for the community to provide input, especially to City Councilors King, Ottaviani, Stefanini and Cannon, who think cutting the schools is just fine, and the abrupt firing of the well regarded Senior Services Director, Randy Aylsworth, may improve services.

One further note relates to solar installations, which have received zero airtime in all of the budget meetings so far.

Simply approving the Farley solar roof project would have improved the city financial picture by $140,000/year for the next 20 years, simply due to the utility savings which would have been realized from that project.

If the City Council had put its weight behind solar installation expansions over the past 4 years, the city would be seeing $1-2 million/year in lowered utility costs, which would have gone a long way towards bridging the current gap in the school system budget.

Councilors King and Cannon have played an especially important role in blocking that solar installation build out. They seem to be allergic to making money from simple environmental action which other cities and towns have easily achieved.

Back to the bigger picture.

Here is a sampling of video comments from prior budget meetings, which provides context for the public hearing:

1. Experienced Teacher Jaimie Dobson Makes a Strong Case for Funding the Schools Properly - which is an accurate summary of the true situation in the schools

2. Framingham Councilor John Stefanini Thinks That the Schools Are just Fine - John thinks this because some past Framingham students just did well at Harvard. He misses the reality that such success actually reflects the state of the schools a decade ago.

3. Stefanini Downplays the Loss of School Staff - He misses the point that cutting 116 staff positions seriously damages classroom support for the teachers who will still be teaching here in the coming year, no matter who actually got pink slips.

4. Stefanini Misleads the Public - He Talks About Cuts Already Done, Not the $3.2 Million In New Cuts

5. Mike Cannon Calls the Superintendent’s Response Cowardly - showing Mike’s lack of support for the Superintendent and schools

6. More Mike Cannon Negativity on the Schools, Including the Superintendent and the School Committee

7. George King Thinks the City Department Reorganization Is Creative and Necessary. - This includes the firing of Randy Aylsworth, Director of Senior Services at Callahan, who had 27 years of experience in senior services, 12 at Callahan, and 3 as its director. Randy was very well regarded in the senior community, and expanded services substantially in recent years. He was the driving force for a comprehensive review of senior services, which is at risk now he is gone.

8. Heather Klisch Explains How the Library Trustees Were Blind-sided by the Department Reorganization

9. George King Admits to His Past Lack of Support for Financial Planning - This is disarmingly simple, but it gives great insight into why in 8 years no long term financially planning was done. This huge failure has led us to this budget crisis.

More videos of the budget meetings and public comments so far my be found at the YouTube channel: Framingham Government In Action.

The public hearing this evening is likely the most important one held in the last 8 years.

It will be very interesting to see who turns up to give the City Council guidance on what matters to the community.